KDHE Computer Services Restored

Recovery and system upgrade costs to be fully covered by technology vendor

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment‘s (KDHE) computer services have been restored.

“We are happy to report that all of our public-facing information systems have now been restored,” said Roderick Bremby, KDHE Secretary. “Our Office of Vital Statistics was the last major information system to come online and we’re currently testing it and anticipate it to be fully functional by Monday. This has been a long road for us. But, more importantly, this has been a long road for you, our customers. We are truly sorry for any inconvenience this has caused and we’re very appreciative of the understanding that’s been displayed.”

The agency began experiencing technical problems on August 5 which caused disruption to many services accessed by the public. On August 11, it was discovered that the problems stemmed from a failure of the storage area network (SAN). In response to this discovery, the SAN vendor, Xiotech, deployed personnel and a new SAN, at their expense, to assist in the assessment and recovery process.

“Xiotech has been involved since the beginning, working hand-in-hand with our IT staff and a third-party consultant, OnTrack,” said Secretary Bremby. “With the assistance of Xiotech and OnTrack, our IT staff has ensured that the 150 servers and 25 terabytes of data has not been compromised.”

In addition to a new SAN, Xiotech has agreed to cover the full costs of recovery and system upgrades. These costs include third-party consultants brought in to assist with data recovery and system restoration. In addition, Xiotech has agreed to reimburse the state for overtime wages and cover the costs associated with reverting to a hard copy system for filling requests for vital records. This means Kansans won’t have to pay for these costs.

“This has been a long and unexpected event for us and for you,” said Secretary Bremby. “We are grateful for your patience. We’re also tremendously grateful for the assistance provided by OnTrack and Xiotech. Because of their assistance, data has been restored quicker than anticipated. And, most of all, I’m especially grateful to KDHE’s IT staff. Without their dedication and knowledge, I am confident that this ‘never’ event would have been significantly worse.”